Resources and notes to assist students of 2107GFS-Visual Story, semester 2, 2012, and 2013. All blog images and posts are copyright 2012 the respective copyright holders, and for academic use only.

“[A good artist is] one with imagination and the ability to tell a good story. How well a man draws cuts no ice with me, if what he’s trying to express comes out vague and choppy.” ‐ Jack Kirby

(Sherman cited in Morrow (ED.) 2004, (vol.1) p. 181).

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

Assessment 2 help: Visual Script development

Ok, a couple of you wanted to double check this, hence the reason behind this post :)

A couple of rough examples of what each submitted element should (roughly) look like. Obviously, this will vary according to your style etc. etc. Any questions, email me!

Also, for those who needed that quick rundown of Adobe After Effects/Premier in class for the animatic process, and have forgotten any steps needed to complete yours, email me and I can walk you through it. Otherwise, there's still 2 weeks after next week, I can help you out in class.

So as you know, the assessment is: (my comments in red)

"Create a story for a predominantly animated short film, however this is not limited to cartoon style

character animation. The story should be around 3 minutes long."

If you have a script, great. If you don't, a story breakdown/synopsis is perfectly fine. IF you're taken a fable and adapted it, and have made any changes for story/logic reasons, state this too :)

So, Mood boards/reference folders categorized into environments costumes/characters, props etc. Basically, if for example your character is a samurai, and you've designed a turnaround shot of a samurai, I want to see images of where you were inspired from, what's the Armour look like, is it the correct century your story is set in etc.

Let's pretend I'm doing a character called "Batman", featuring a short sequence with a Tank/Sports Car-like "Batmobile", in a dark city, and some goons to fight. Some Concept stuff might look like this.

Etc. etc. You get the idea. Check your lecture notes on "Thumbnailing" and "Referencing"

Thumbnails, Roughs and the proper clean up storyboards, compelee with camera movements, arrows etc. where applicable. Try to present storyboards in any of the ways shown in class. There are templates available for the 3 panel widescreen film style in the Course content tab- inclass exercises-Exercise 2: Camera Conventions Folder at Learning @ GU, or on the Right hand side of this blog for the 3 across 2D animation still boards. 3-6 panels a page is fine.

Template at Learning @ GU, or click and "Save As"

"examples of moodboards of two sequences of varying tones"

A Typo: Do Colourboards instead (Moodboards are part of referencing anyway). See Week 9 Lecture notes.

See Andi's Week 10 notes on Layout and Pre-Viz, and try to include field guides (templates under the Graticules folder in Course content tab.

Or 2D examples:

NOTE: If your project is live action, still do this as if it was "Set design", much like the character turnaround shot would be "Costume Design".

"An animatic is also required that indicates broad timing and pacing for the project."

Either 3 minutes of rough "key" shots, or 1.5 minutes of "every" intended shot is fine, if a full 3 minute animatic is too overwhelming. Do your best. Also, you don't need dialogue or sound effects, but a bit of appropriate music might be an idea to help with your intended editing/pacing/rhythm

Further details and delivery instructions to be announced in class and with assignment handouts in week 2. The project is designed to develop a feasible script for possible production as a graduating project during the program. this is NOT intended to be the final idea that will be made, but a draft development exercise in realising the range of aspects that need to be determined to develop a good short project